Happy Birthday, Spike
by Sirhith
Summary: Dawn finds an interesting bit of research and wants to put it to use. Will the funky party weasels rise to the occasion? Set vaguely after 5x18.


The last four hours had made for an uneventful Saturday at the Summers house. Glory research hadn't yielded many results, and everybody was starting to wear out.

"Hey look at this, you guys." Dawn still wasn't technically allowed to research, but Buffy convinced herself that anything her little sister dug up meant they'd be that much closer to some answers.

Dawn was beaming at the book closest to her elbow. "It's Spike's birthday today. Well, William the Bloody's, I guess." She slid the book across the dining room table so the others could see.

"Really?" Tara leaned in to get a closer look. "Wow, 150. That's quite the milestone. A ses-something-centennial. What's it called again, hon?"

"A sesquicentennial," said Willow, beaming.

"And it seems like just yesterday he was a spry 148, locking us in an abandoned factory and threatening our lives," Xander chimed in, raising an eyebrow. "How time flies."

"So what's the game plan?" Dawn asked, shifting her attention from face to face. "Roller rink and cake-a-palooza?"

"Spike doesn't really seem like the birthday type," said Willow. "I don't know that he'd even want us mentioning it."

"He'd have to be crazy," said Anya, "not to want the cake and the presents and the rounding your age down so nobody suspects how crusty you really are. Isn't everyone the birthday type?"

"Well if the rest of you want to get down in the name of Spike's continued existence, go ahead and rely on somebody else for the homemade guacamole," said Xander, taking a bite of the apple in his hand. "I have a strict 140-year limit on birthdays."

Buffy was flipping through a book the size of an encyclopedia that had zero paragraph breaks, and she could feel a headache coming on. "We should probably just ignore it, Dawnie. Willow's got a point. And Spike's still recovering from Glory… I don't know."

"Exactly!" Dawn threw her arms out wide. "I mean, he saved my life, didn't he? He could've told Glory where I was, but he didn't. That should at least earn him an ice cream cake."

Tara pursed her lips. "Do you think Spike's ever gotten anything on his birthday?" she asked, of no one in particular. She laced her fingers with Willow's on top of the table. "Maybe Dawn's idea's not so crazy."

"Eee! Yes! Tara's with me—anybody else?"

Willow wilted under Tara's hopeful gaze. "Okay, yeah, fine. Everybody good with mint chip?"

Buffy crossed her arms over her chest. "If we're gonna do this, let's just make it as low-key as possible."

"Any more low-key than frozen food, and we'd all be dead," said Anya.

"Nobody's expecting this to be awkward at all?" Xander said. "What kind of party do you throw for a guy who's had over a century of 'em?"

"I don't know," said Willow, the crease in her forehead softening. "I kinda doubt Drusilla was big on Pin the Tail on the Ghora Demon."

"Alright, fine." Buffy slammed her book shut. She needed to focus on something other than 10-point font. "Willow and Tara, you guys are on cake. Xander and Anya… find some Chex Mix and soda somewhere. We have to make this look really casual."

"So that means I can—"

"_No_. No streamers, Dawn. Under any circumstances."

Two hours later, the Scoobies found themselves poised in the Summers living room, trying to look natural amidst a plastic tray of veggies and dip, a cheese platter, and a rapidly softening ice cream cake ("With red velvet cake, so it's like blood?" Dawn had pleaded). Buffy had caved and allowed Dawn three balloons in the corner, each representing a digit of Spike's age, because really, he was gonna figure it out in the first five seconds. He wasn't an idiot.

Tara and Willow had chaperoned Dawn over to Spike's crypt so she could give him an implausible story about how Buffy was being pinned to a tree by a bug-eyed, furry-looking thing in front of her own house in broad daylight, and had found time in the fray to specifically call for Spike's help.

Tara and Willow tried their best to feign concern, but the way they both bobbed their heads in earnest after every sentence from Dawn let Spike know something was dodgy.

Just sitting up from his sarcophagus was agony, because his ribs were still bruised from Glory. He reckoned he would've cursed for a solid minute if Dawn hadn't been there.

"Yeah, 'lright," he said, clenching his jaw. "Suppose it's worth a look."

After making it back to her front yard, Dawn led the way up onto the porch and into the living room. She was so excited that she completely forgot to follow through on her story for Spike and acknowledge that Buffy must have found a way to slay the thing after all, but oh look, didn't he want some fruit punch?

Spike took one look at the spread and made a face like he'd been told he would have to live with Xander again. "What the bleeding _HELL_ is this?"

"…Happy birthday," Dawn said, keeping her voice meek but with a note of enthusiasm that she hoped would prevent Spike from flipping any tables.

"No pet, I don't have a birthday anymore, all I've got's a _re_-birthday, and I don't do much for that either." He scoffed. "They put you up to this? Thought you'd all get a good laugh?"

Xander raised a hand from his spot over by the paper plates, which had _Over the Hill!_ and cartoon tombstones printed on them. "Well, I went on record as saying this was a terrible idea, so…"

"It was me, I wanted to do it," Dawn said. "It's not a big deal, I just thought—"

Spike took one look at her crestfallen face. "Oh, bugger all. Let's have a bit of cake, if it'll make you happy." He held out a hand to Willow, who swiftly plated a piece for him without comment.

Spike stuck it out for as long as he could, which turned out to be roughly thirty minutes. Being a vampire, the cake had tasted like chalk. Everyone was too afraid to be overly festive, so Buffy, Xander, and Willow had holed up in the corner to discuss Glory in hushed tones. Anya was sitting next to Tara on the couch, picking from the cheese platter and regaling her with a story of the _last_ cheese platter she'd seen at a party—in her dimension. When the cheese was cubes of ex-boyfriends. Tara was trying to show polite interest, but her face was beginning to pale.

Spike was left with Dawn, who was on the verge of her fourth or fifth apology.

"You say another word, and I'll go find that TV star you fancy so much and bite him 'til he cries." His abandoned plate sat on the carpet, the ice cream forming a pool. He toed the cardboard lip with his boot. "Shouldn't be much of a challenge. I can take the headache."

"Who, James Van Der Beek?"

"Nah, the one from the seventies program."

"Ashton Kutcher?"

Spike snapped his fingers. "Ashton Kutcher, that's right. If you want his soul forever cursed, you'll keep talking."

"I dunno, it might be kinda cool." Dawn scraped up some stray frosting on her own plate with the side of her plastic fork. "Maybe he'd start picking more dramatic roles."

"Xander?" Anya called. She had just finished explaining to Tara how she couldn't eat from the veggie tray on principle (rabbit food). "Can we go find some actual food, now?"

The party, if you could call it that, broke up not long after that. Buffy got everyone to agree to come back to the house in the morning for French toast and more research.

Spike hung back in the kitchen while Buffy put cling wrap over the uneaten food and tried to wrestle it all into the fridge. In a unique display of tact, Dawn excused herself to her room.

"Great party, Slayer." He wasn't entirely sure how sarcastic he'd meant it to sound.

"Yeah, I…" she finished cramming the cake remains into the freezer, and wedged the door shut. "I'm really sorry—"

Spike huffed. "You Summers women sure love your apologizing."

"Well, I… I should've explained things better to Dawn, but she was so excited." She took a seat at the island across from him.

"Yeah. Don't want to disappoint the little bit." He smiled. Then his face fell. "I was such a ponce, Buffy."

"Dawn'll be fine."

"No—I mean when I was human." He ran a hand over his face. "Ow! Sodding—"

Buffy retrieved a bag of blueberries from the freezer. "Here."

"Thanks," Spike said sheepishly, placing the bag over his left eye. The swelling had gone down, but not entirely. In the silence, he continued. "Not as if this is a drastic change from who I was back then." He lifted the bag and gave himself a once-over. "Sniveling little bastard who couldn't do a thing to save his own life. Thank God Dru did it for me."

"Don't say it like that," Buffy said, an edge to her voice.

"You didn't know me then," Spike countered.

"I know you now," she said, chin raised. She shifted her weight to one side so she could get something out of her jeans pocket. "You've managed to improve since I met you, even."

"It's the chip."

"It's not," Buffy said. "Not completely."

"I hate my sodding birthday."

"Well, it's the only one of yours that I care about." Buffy held a closed fist out over the countertop. "Re-birthdays are cop outs." She made a little flicking motion with her wrist, signaling that Spike should hold out his hand.

She dropped it into his open palm: a Zippo lighter, matte black. Like the one he had, except that one was silver, and he'd had it since the eighties. It was showing its age in scratches and dings.

He flipped it open and flicked the flame into being. "Well, it's certainly no cheese platter. And here I was, thinking that's all I was worth." He smirked before flipping it closed.

"Happy birthday, Spike."

"It had bloody well better be the last one we ever talk about."


End file.
